


[EN]Sideway: Burt Curtis

by Laclale



Series: TKTR AU and its references [7]
Category: Henry Stickmin Series (Video Games), MIT mystery hunt
Genre: Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Gen, Originally Posted on Tumblr, POV First Person, Riddles, burt turned into anomaly, puzzle hunt, told by Burt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-22 10:33:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30037359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laclale/pseuds/Laclale
Summary: This was when he was a student in a famous puzzle hunt one year….
Series: TKTR AU and its references [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2207892
Kudos: 1





	[EN]Sideway: Burt Curtis

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 日本語 available: [[JP]ハントを止めるな！](https://archiveofourown.org/works/30037641) by [ラクレール (Laclale)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laclale/pseuds/%E3%83%A9%E3%82%AF%E3%83%AC%E3%83%BC%E3%83%AB)



> Original post: multiple

About this mystery hunt, there is one piece of information that you need to know for your understanding.

This coin was the “Center Of Illegal NRG”.

* * *

Have you ever heard of a mystery hunt? It’s a puzzle hunt that is sometimes attempted outside the confines of the school.

It could be a fish puzzle with no such thing as, or the answer embedded in the title of the product for sale, or a mystery in the advertising.

The opening of this mystery hunt was held in the form of a preview of a movie about the mystery hunt itself.

* * *

The film begins with the following synopsis: “An independent film about a puzzle hunt is being shot at a university. There is an abominable urban legend that every year some of the students who participate in the puzzle hunt become psychic.” I feel like this urban legend is similar to the one about the meteorite, but the fact that it happens every year is a problem for me…

The first round took place when the crew realized that they had lost the film of the climactic scene and we're looking for it. The setting used was the first round of the Hunt on film.

* * *

The preview staff announced the site and I started solving the mystery with Eric and his team instead of my usual hack team.

This round’s riddles included a riddle using a document about a frequent category, and a spreadsheet function test. Also, riddles using the contents of past haunts.

I didn’t use the puzzle in my First Aid kit this round. For those of you who are wondering what that is, it contains a disinfectant solution made by one of the sponsors of this hunt and the FAQ… I never looked at it in the first place.

The first round meta answer was that the production climax had not yet been shot. Just as we sent this answer to the staff, we received a call that the staff had found a spare rehearsal film.

In the rehearsal film, the key box in which the abilities were embedded was unlocked and the coins were obtained. Here it was revealed that the theme of this hunt was actually “ONE CUT OF THE HUNT”, in other words, it was a play within a play. It was as if we were being sucked into the movie.

The staff of the movie said that the university where the movie was set was exactly the same as the university where this haunt was set. It seemed kind of self-defeating, but a new round had been unlocked on the sie.

* * *

The new rounds were meant to be solved in parallel, so we decided to split up and solve them. So, I was assigned to the sponsorship themed round.

Yes, the First Aid Kit puzzle was the puzzle for this round. I spent the first round unlocking the kit, writing the riddles (all conversion riddles), the answers to the riddles, and the letters on the disinfectant containers in the instructions. And the corresponding flavor was “Please solve the letters on your disinfectant in the same way as the lock! So I converted them the same way. It’s kind of funny, it’s like a hint water riddle I saw somewhere.

There were more fake sponsors tied to the puzzles in this round than there were sponsors in this hunt, but the reality is revealed in the meta. The instructions given in the meta for this round were "redo in real”, which in essence means “again with real sponsors”. Some of the fake sponsors were used as an abbreviation of the real sponsor’s name, and if the sponsor provided a product, that product was included in the puzzle.

After the sponsorship-themed round, I looked back at the rehearsal film to see if there was anything else I could do.

* * *

An essential part of this kind of media is to identify the sacred place. After the sponsorship-themed round, I went alone to the place I had seen in the rehearsal film.

Sure enough, there was no key box, but I could feel that there was a coin there. At the time, I and everyone else didn’t understand that it was a coin, but the next time we came here… during the Final Runaround, it was encrypted like crazy, but everyone understood that it was written in the script.

…How do I know that’s what was written in the coded script? I was in that place, and I was just as psychic as the characters in the movie. I didn’t feel the pain as intensely as they did, but… I was caught on the camera that the crew had set up to capture invisible auras.

An aura of letters was created to overflow from the place where I felt the pain. Once the aura covered my entire body, the pain subsided and I was able to use my “decrypt” ability to decipher any code with a little information.

Now I can help everyone else. I decided to help Eric and the others with the cipher problem they were stuck on.

* * *

Eric and his team were so good that they had already solved the test-solved ones. So I was able to help them with the untested problems…the ones without appointments. The problem was… terrible. The problem didn’t seem to work in the first place because the author didn’t know about the change just before the hunt started. It was a problem before the backsolve.

This reached the rest of the team as well. As an apology, the information that was supposed to be available was added to all the unannounced problems. From there, we got it right as fast as we could, and were the first to make it to the Final Runaround. Yes, that terrible script problem.

The script contained information about the passcode that we couldn’t see on the film, even though it was encrypted in a messy way. But my decryptor is good enough to overlay the original text and make it readable as normal. Just like, “ "Move to …. This is the location of the Year A coin." The passcode is not directly written in the script…” I muttered, and they return “What?” “We can’t read at all, how can you tell?”.

Finally, the staff said, “…I think it’s dangerous for the main actor to open the key box. I think it’s better to let him who can read the script normally open it.” and I did.

Now that we’ve finished shooting the movie, it’s time to wrap it up.


End file.
